Read Part 5

(9/1) We are in part six of our message series "A Bigger Story" and we have seen how the church has been growing exponentially ever since the coming of the Holy Spirit. However, there were many Jews who were not happy about that because they were defensive of Jerusalem, the temple, and the law because that was their heritage. In other words, they didn’t like Jesus and his disciples coming in and changing the way they interpreted things, the traditions, and what they were hoping for.

And so, they were looking for any opportunity to shut down the disciples, twisting the teachings of Jesus, and they targeted a man named Stephen. This was the first big wave of persecution in the church after the resurrection of Jesus. And like a lynch mob, they surrounded Stephen, seized him, and brought him before the Sanhedrin. These were the same people who charged Jesus with death by crucifixion, and they accused Stephen of blaspheming God, the temple, Moses, and the law.

As they were making these charges against Stephen, they saw his face become like that of an angel. In other words, his face had a supernatural glow or brightness to it. This was something similar to the appearance of Moses face when he came down the mountain from being in the presence of God. Or like Jesus when he was transfigured before Peter, James, and John, and they saw the glory radiating from him on the mountain top. And so, Stephen is powerfully filled with the Holy Spirit, he is transformed, and he speaks boldly to the Sanhedrin reminding them of their not so glamorous past.

Now, as we pick up in Acts chapter seven, he responds to their accusations very graciously, developing common ground with them, referring to them as brothers and the patriarchs as their fathers. Then, as we pick up at verse 39, he begins to tell the part of their story, some of their history that they would rather forget about. And most of us can relate, because no matter whether you are a church person or a nonchurch person every single one of us has parts of our story that we are not proud of. And so, Stephen continues, he reminds them,

"But our fathers refused to obey him. Instead, they rejected him and in their hearts turned back to Egypt" (Acts 7:39).

And so, the children of Israel refused to obey Moses and began thinking about what they had left behind in Egypt. In other words, the conditions in the desert were not what they were accustomed to because they had become comfortable with the habits, the traditions, the morals, and the gods of the Egyptian. And so, Stephen reminds them that the first thing they did in the wilderness after they had escaped Pharaoh was to imitate the idolatry of the Egyptians. He says in verse forty,

"They told Aaron, 'Make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who led us out of Egypt — we don't know what has happened to him!' That was the time they made an idol in the form of a calf. They brought sacrifices to it and held a celebration in honor of what their hands had made. But God turned away and gave them over to the worship of the heavenly bodies" (Acts 7:40-42).

And so, Stephen reminds them of that time in their history when God turned away. Now, this wasn’t the only time, but he is making the point that even as God’s chosen people they can miss out on the promises of God. And so, he says that their fathers, the children of Abraham, those who escaped from Egypt, who were delivered through the Red Sea, were brought into a relationship with God who himself declared,

"You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself" (Exodus 19:4).

But then, no sooner had Moses gone up on the mountain to receive the testimony of their covenant with God did the people gather around Aaron pressuring him and saying,

"Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him" (Exodus 32:1).

And so, Stephen reminds them of their history, because their history was intended to be a lesson for them. But the Jewish leaders chose to ignore their past, even wishing like many of us do, that they could remove the pages and chapters of their story.

However, God had seen the wicked idolatry and the evil things they had done at the foot of the mountain, celebrating with singing and dancing and sexual immorality in front of the golden calf Aaron had made. And so, he sent Moses down from the mountain and when Moses saw the calf and the people dancing, he began to intercede for the children of Israel but the Bible says,

"The Lord struck the people with a plague because of what they did with the calf Aaron had made" (Exodus 32:35).

In other words, the destroying angel came into the camp and thousands were killed, because this wasn’t just a rejection of Moses, it was a rejection of God himself. And so, Stephen reminded the Sanhedrin how,

"God turned away and gave them over to the worship of the heavenly bodies" (Acts 7:42).

In other words, God gave them over to the sinful desires of their hearts, to sexual immorality, to serving created things rather than the creator, and worshiping the sun, moon, and the stars. And so, they were worshiping the gods of the pagan unbelieving nations, and Stephen says in verse 42,

"This agrees with what is written in the book of the prophets," and he quotes the prophet Amos who said,

"'Did you bring me sacrifices and offerings forty years in the desert, O house of Israel? You have lifted up the shrine of Molech and the star of your god Rephan, the idols you made to worship" (Acts 7:42-43).

And so, even though the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud and by night in a pillar of fire, many of the Israelites also continued in their idolatry, worshiping the gods of the Egyptians, the gods of the ammonites, and the gods of the Assyrians. As a result, God told Israel that he would "send them into exile beyond Babylon."

Stephen stands courageously before the Sanhedrin like Daniel standing before Nebuchadnezzar and he boldly declares the truth because he knows they need to hear it. They have been mad long enough, it’s time to move on from elementary things, going on to maturity, and so he’s got to get this off of his chest. He is hoping and praying that some of them would repent and be saved, but he just can’t understand how they could be so judgmental and self-righteous having crucified the Lord Jesus, and forgetting about themselves, forgetting where they came from, and forgetting their own story.

And so, Stephen declares the truth of Scripture with the intent that they would remember where they came from, not having to go back over it again and again, but moving on to maturity and perfection. He warns them of their past because they should know better and he shows them the similarity between the way their fathers treated the prophets and the way they had treated Jesus. And he is encouraging them to go deeper into the things of God, to walk in faith and freedom, not being entangled again in a yoke of bondage; but they keep going back to the law with all of its ceremonies and the circumcision, instead of faith in Christ.

In the same way, it’s important that we understand our Bibles so that we can move on to maturity, because the Spirit of God wants to take us from grace to glory. In other words, we want to move from elementary things, to another level of maturity, a deeper spirituality so that like Job we can say with confidence,

"When He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold. My foot has held fast to His steps; I have kept His way and not turned aside" (Job 23:10-11, NKJV).

And so, when you are in trouble, when you are under pressure, when you are experiencing persecution and attacks like Stephen, and everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted; stand firm and keep fighting the good fight of faith, because when you do you shall come forth as gold.

Stephen is teaching us of better things, comparing the old covenant with the new covenant, reminding the Sanhedrin of that time when the children of Israel were going through the wilderness and lived day by day eating from the hand of God. For forty years in the wilderness, they never needed to worry about what to eat or what to wear, and even the soles of their sandals never wore out (Deuteronomy 29:5).

There are some of you here who know exactly what I’m talking about, because you have experienced the provision of God, and it was so powerful in your life it may not have looked like you were getting ahead, but God was sustaining you because you weren’t going down either. In other words, you might not have climbed out, but you never went under because God was protecting you. He was making a way where there was no way. In fact, the Spirit of God said,

"I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland" (Isaiah 43:19).

And so, you didn’t recognize that at the time, but God was opening doors for you, he kept your car running, he helped you keep your sanity when you were about to break down.

There are some of you who don’t look like what you have been through. In fact, you are praising God today because you are still here, the cancer didn’t get you, the haters didn’t get you, they thought you weren’t going to make it, but God sustained you. I don’t know about you, but sometimes I just want to start laughing like Elizabeth when she became pregnant with John the Baptist. I just want to tell somebody,

"Look what the Lord has done" (Luke 1:25, NCV).

For forty years, the children of Israel had been wearing the same pair sandals. God fed them, sustained them, provided for them, and now they don’t believe that God could do anything new. In fact, the Sanhedrin denied the existence of angels and spirits and the afterlife, and so they didn’t believe in the supernatural, or that God performs miracles, even raising the dead.

And so, Stephen is like, "Why do you want the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic of Egypt? Why did your hearts turn back to Egypt?" (Numbers 11:5).

Like Moses going up on the mountaintop and seeing the glory of God and coming back down only to discover that the people he was leading were dancing drunk and naked around a golden calf. Stephen is frustrated with the leaders of Israel and he wants to scream at them, "Why do you continue to reject Jesus, our Messiah, crucified, dead, buried, and raised again on the third day? Why do you walk past him as if you are looking for somebody else?"

But he doesn’t, he speaks to them with grace, and gives them the opportunity to believe and repent; because "Jesus is the stone the builders rejected, he has become the capstone, and salvation is found in no one else. For there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:11-12). In other words, Stephen knows that none of them deserve God’s mercy, and it’s only by grace that he is saved. And so, he praises God for having mercy when he didn’t get it right.

Now he is standing up for God, speaking up and declaring the truth of God, even if it might cost him his life. And in spite of the lies and the accusations, he knew that whatever happened, whatever it cost him, that he would see Jesus. And I love that about God, because when you are in trouble, he gets right down there in the fire with you because he is that fourth man in the fire, he is our refuge and strength,

"A stronghold in times of trouble" (Psalms 9:9).

I don’t know who that is for, but I came to tell somebody, you may be in a hard place right now, a difficult place right now, but you are not in that place by yourself because Jesus is with you.

You see, I may be "hard pressed on every side", but I am going to work through it. "In a hard place, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed" (2 Corinthians 4:8-9).

In other words, I may be down, but I am not out because,

"The Lord is with me; and he is my helper" (Psalms 118:7).

Stephen could look in triumph on his enemies because he knew the Lord will be with him wherever he went. In fact, the psalmist said it this way,

"If I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast" (Psalms 139:8-10).

And that is the truth, just like Jesus had been leading Israel through the wilderness, lap after lap around the desert, the Bible says,

"They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them and that rock was Christ" (1 Corinthians 10:3-4).

Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered over the desert, and even Moses was caught up in their sin. But in spite of their murmuring and complaining, God said to Moses, I want you to demonstrate before my people that I am their provider.

"Speak to that rock before their eyes and it will pour out its water" (Numbers 20:8).

However, Moses struck the rock two times with his staff in frustration when he should have spoken to the rock. Now, water did gush out, but God said to Moses,

"Because you did not trust in me enough to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them" (Numbers 20:12).

In other words, God had commanded Moses to speak to the rock, but because he reacted in anger, he exalted himself, and failed to glorify God, because a man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires (James 1:20). And so, Moses strongest point was his humility, and that is exactly where he failed, falling into temptation, and therefore he missed the blessing that God had planned for him.

It seems so simple, all he had to do was speak to the rock, believing God for the impossible, and God was going to make streams of living waters flow from the rock (John 7:38).

If you are listening to me today, God is about to do something if you have enough faith to speak it. If you speak it, it is going to flow, it’s going to happen, it is going to come to pass, but you’ve got to believe that you have the power in your tongue to change situations in your life. In other words, it’s in your mouth, it’s in your words, it’s in your speaking, but the devil doesn’t want you to believe. He wants you to murmur and complain, he wants you to sit there passively and quietly saying, "Well, if it’s God’s will," but the devil is a liar. The Bible says,

"The tongue has the power of life and death" (Proverbs 18:21).

And so, the tongue has the power, and that’s why Jesus said to speak to that mountain, because if anyone says to this mountain,

"Go, throw yourself into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him" (Mark 11:23).

You see, the devil doesn’t want you to know that you have this authority to move mountains, to change situations in your life, to speak life into your dead circumstances, and to speak healing to your disease. But that is exactly what the Bible says, "Let the weak say" what?

"Let the weak say, "I am strong" (Joel 3:10, NKJV).

And so, I dare you to open your mouth and speak it, because God has so designed it to be in his kingdom. You have kingdom authority, Jesus said,

"Whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours" (Mark 11:24).

Now, that makes me think that there might be a whole lot more positivity in this room, a lot more encouragement, and a lot of edification in the church as we declare the supernatural authority of the kingdom. Not grumbling and complaining, but speaking life and blessing to one another, healing to one another and deliverance to one another, breaking yokes and setting the captives free.

We want to be the kind of people, the kind of church, that would speak blessings to one another, because God responds to that kind of word. And so, I wish somebody would give him some praise right now, because rivers of living water are beginning to flow. Somebody give him some praise, somebody worship God because,

"No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him" (1 Corinthians 2:9).

Would you receive this word today? Speak it over yourself, over your mind, over your heart, and receive the fullness of God’s Spirit, a good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over.

As we bring this to a close, we’re going to praise God and give him thanks, but there may be some of you who say, "Well, my story is so far from perfect." And that’s okay, because neither is mine, but guess what? Our stories aren’t finished yet, our stories are part of a bigger story, and Jesus can help us live the story that he wants you to tell. If you seek him, you will find him, and so, let’s fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.

As we close in prayer, I believe we are on the precipice, the pinnacle of a great move of God, and water is about to gush out of the rock. He is getting ready to pour out his Spirit saturating you in supernatural power as you humble yourself before him, getting down into the flow of his Spirit, trusting in his strength rather than your own.

Read Part 7

Read past sermons by Pastor John Talcott